Blog post – Fancy a change?
You do? Good, because there’s a hell of a lot of it coming up. I’ve been rather smug in the past in considering the sales profession a very safe and secure place to be. My thinking went that there will always be stuff to be sold, whether it’s products, services or ideas. That side of the buying/selling equation will stay near enough the same (aside from the shift that has already happened from sale people to internet based sales for commodity goods). On the whole, the changes have been and will be in the market side – what buyers are doing.
Think about it:
* The sales practices of 30 years ago won’t cut it today
* The sales practices of 10 years ago would be pretty borderline in acceptance and effectiveness – selling has moved from being about convincing and persuading, towards adding value to the customer
* Less and less of the buying cycle is done with a sales person present
* A CSO report I read (sorry, lost the link) indicates tha sales cycles are lengthening and therefore sales is becoming less efficient
* Most buyers research online before talking to a sales person
* Some (not all) people are finding new, better ways to get that information : blogs, forums, web 2.0 services, conferences. These are all ways to circumvent the sales person. If these methods are more effective they will take on and spread.
* In general in society the pace of change is quickening (you can see that all around us) and we are all going to have to learn to adapt.
* Anecdotally, I would say that increasing numbers of organisations have formal procedures for buying (designed to limit your power to influence). The organisations that have / use these seem to be getting smaller
What are the consequences of these changes? What will our jobs look like in 10 years time? Personally, on one hand I am excited. The job-for-life concept sounds awful to me and change brings fresh opportunities. On the other, there have been and will be casualties and we will all have to adapt or die. Quite how we adapt is another question.
Tags: change, sales profession
